Gender and willingness to lead – does the gender composition of teams matter?

We explore how team gender composition affects willingness to lead by randomly assigning participants in an experiment to male- or female-majority teams. Irrespective of team gender composition, men are substantially more willing than women to lead their team and both men and women are more willing to lead female-majority teams. This effect is statistically significant for the full sample and separately for women. An analysis of mechanisms reveals that a large share of the negative effect of male-majority teams on women’s leadership aspirations is accounted for by a negative effect on women’s confidence, influence, and expected support from team members.

Keywords: leadership, gender differences, experiment

JEL Classification: C92, J16

Suggested Citation: Suggested Citation

Born, Andreas and Ranehill, Eva and Sandberg, Anna, Gender and willingness to lead – does the gender composition of teams matter? (March 1, 2020). Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3207198 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3207198